Increased energy prices could “cause heart attacks and strokes”
In the middle of the cost of living crisis, the press has found yet another reason people might keel over… and it’s still not the vaccine.
By Kit Knightly | OffGuardian | February 5, 2022
Our UK readers will be familiar with the press coverage of the cost of living crisis in this country, as wages continue to fall further and further behind inflation, and the economy reels from the deliberately devastating lockdown, the cost of everything from food to fuel is ever increasing.
People are understandably troubled and anxious, whether or not the energy cost crisis is genuine or manufactured for the sake of profits, the reality is that many people will face the choice of heating their homes or eating enough food over the last two months of winter and into the spring.
This could easily result in people – especially the elderly or disabled – suffering health problems or even death due to the cold or malnutrition. Many of these people will likely become “covid cases” or “covid deaths” once they’re subjected to the totally unreliable tests.
It’s all a perfect little circuit. And it serves the Covid agenda in more ways than one, because it’s just handed the press yet another explanation for heart attacks that haven’t happened yet.
It seems like only a few days ago we ran an article pointing out all the numerous different reasons the press are predicting people will have heart attacks this year… and that’s because it was.
Stress, anxiety, the weather, “long covid” and a plague of undiagnosed aortic stenosis are all predicted to cause thousands upon thousands of heart attacks and strokes in the near future.
And now so is the increased cost of living.
Appearing on Lorraine on ITV yesterday morning, Dr Amir Khan claimed:
… if you can’t afford to heat your home, it actually causes an increased risk of developing heart attacks and strokes because your blood vessels contract to conserve heat, which pushes your blood pressure up, and over time that has an impact on your heart attack risk.”
In future, maybe they should simply run press releases saying “Covid vaccine only thing in world which doesn’t cause a heart attack”
As Neil Oliver pointed out on Twitter…
Stop ‘harmful’ mass testing of children now, demand MPs
TCW Defending Freedom – February 4, 2022
THE cross-party Pandemic Response and Recovery All-Party Parliamentary Group of MPs met this week to hear whether there is a case for the continued mass testing of healthy children by schools and nurseries.
The committee is co-chaired by Conservative MP Esther McVey and Labour MP Graham Stringer. The group examined the pros and cons of testing in schools, and growing concerns about the likely physical and mental health harms caused by constant testing. Their uncompromising conclusion was that the mass testing of healthy children is ‘harmful, invasive and unevidenced’.
Ms McVey told the group something few of the public outside parents are aware of, which is that children are still routinely being asked to take tests, even at primary school, regardless of whether they have symptoms.
Though the threat of school closures has been lifted and the requirement for children to wear masks rescinded, hundreds of thousands of children are still missing schooling, she said, owing to constant testing and the government requirement for healthy children to isolate.
She informed the group that the evidence presented by their experts found no benefits to mass testing and that the children are not drivers of transmission. They have been disrupted, harmed and distressed despite the absence of any robust randomised control trial evidence of the benefits of mass testing them: ‘The evidence we have heard is clear. Testing in schools must stop, especially in the absence of any sort of study on the impact it has on our children’s physical and mental health. Evidence sessions such as this one are so important, to allow us to get a full picture before we make a decision and put our case to the Government.’
Mr Stringer said: ‘We cannot continue to force such an invasive procedure and we have heard today of children as young as two being physically restrained by their parents, put in headlocks or vomiting after the tests. As I have said before, the evidence to impose these sorts of measures must be overwhelming and I’m not aware the evidence exists that testing healthy children is beneficial and will help stop the spread of SAR-CoV-2. Not to mention the eye-watering sums spent on testing which could have been so much better spent on redressing some of the damage already caused to child mental health. Surely the time has come to stop the mass testing of healthy children?’
The group heard from Dr Angela E Raffle, honorary senior lecturer, University of Bristol Medical School Department of Population Health Sciences, Dr Allyson Pollock, clinical professor of public health at the University of Newcastle, child and adolescent clinical psychologist Dr Zenobia Storah, Professor Ellen Townsend, professor of psychology at the University of Nottingham and Mark Ward, a parent who spoke about the traumatic experiences of testing his toddler.
They all argued against the mass testing of healthy children in schools, highlighting the insufficient scientific and clinical evidence and arguing that, far from being of any public health benefit, mass testing causes significant damage to children.
Dr Raffle said: ‘SARS-CoV-2 testing of healthy school children needs to stop. The World Health Organisation cautions against mass symptomless testing because of high costs, lack of evidence on impact, and risk of diverting resources from more important activities. There is no sound evidence that testing children leads to reduction in serious cases of Covid-19. The policy decision in England to introduce school testing appears to have been a political decision, to create the impression of safety, rather than investing in staffing and ventilation which would have made an impact. The tests being used have not been properly evaluated as self-tests or for use in children. Children are low transmitters compared with adults. The net effect of the school testing is harmful because of the trauma of repeated testing and the disruption to children’s lives through repeated exclusion and isolation. Testing is important when done under medical supervision in order to guide decisions about the best way to treat a child who is ill, but the indiscriminate use of tests in children who are well is unjustified.’
Professor Pollock said: ‘Many of the so-called public health measures applied over the last two years have been no more than blanket measures applied with no evidence but with serious consequences, such as mass testing healthy school children. The tests are inappropriate and in the UK we completely ignored the Wilson and Junger 1968 principles of screening. They are not tests of infectiousness so children were and are being isolated unnecessarily. We know from studies that infected children do not spread the virus to others readily, not other children, their families nor their teachers. Now with the milder Omicron variant, many of them will be asymptomatic, so constantly mass testing healthy children is not only a traumatic experience but an appalling waste of time and is something that should only be done if clinically necessary, such as if a child is ill enough to need medical attention.’
Dr Storah described mass testing of healthy children as ‘harmful, invasive and unevidenced’ and ‘nothing short of state-sponsored child abuse’. She said: ‘I have been working with young people throughout the last two years and have seen a steep rise in mental health conditions as a result of measures like testing. These obsessive infection control measures are causing worrying levels of highly anxious behaviour. They maintain and amplify the fear messaging, further exacerbated when children are surrounded by adults, their parents or teachers, also constantly testing. It is utterly extraordinary for a society to treat their young in such an abusive way, to throw decades of understanding about normal child development out of the window without having considered the risk factors. One in six young people now meets the diagnostic criteria for at least one mental health disorder but there is still time to lessen and even reverse the long-term psychological impact this is having on our children. Children and adolescents need to be prioritised and mass testing, like face coverings, must be consigned to the policy bin, once and for all. What is required immediately is a return to normality for all children and all school and extra-curricular environments.’
Professor of Psychology Ellen Townsend told the group: ‘It is unclear what mass testing healthy children is achieving from a Public Health perspective. No studies have been carried out to understand if there are any benefits and no evaluation has been done on the psychological impact of testing – this is a grave and unethical oversight. We must recognise that children are at minimal risk to others but the harms caused to children, the disruption of testing protocols in schools and the resulting absences, are completely disproportionate to the proclaimed benefits of indiscriminate mass testing. The president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health was quite correct when she said last year that testing in schools was causing unnecessary chaos.’
You can find information about the APPG and its membership here and here.
No question the vaccines increase your susceptibility to COVID. What else do they do?
By Meryl Nass, MD | February 3, 2022
https://www.publichealthscotland.scot/media/11404/22-02-02-covid19-winter_publication_report.pdf
If you live in Scotland, a small country, the government, with its NHS, is like Santa: it knows if you’ve been bad or good. Scotland has 5.5 million residents. Over 5 million of them are listed in Scotland’s report of cases, above. The rest are kids too young for the vaccine. Sadly for Scots, 80% went along with the jab. It didn’t help them. And you can’t dispute these numbers: look at the narrow confidence intervals.
So now we know the jabbed get more COVID. What we suspect is that they also get more heart attacks, strokes, blood clots, autoimmune diseases and myocarditis. Will Scotland release those data, ever?
Different vaccines reveal different side effects
MHRA should release the raw data for public scrutiny
Health Advisory & Recovery Team | February 1, 2022
The MHRA Yellow Card reporting system is designed to provide a signal of possible problems with new drugs based on reports of suspected adverse reactions from qualified medical practitioners. The data collected could be of much more value if more details were published. The MHRA shares such information with the pharmaceutical industry but, despite its role being to protect the public and relying on public funding, this data is not put into the public domain.
To make the most of what information is available the reports on different vaccine types can be compared. Any side effects that are a result of the production of the spike protein itself may be similar between all vaccine types. However, if one vaccine type has a much higher rate of a particular adverse effect than other vaccine types then this is suggestive of a genuine causal relationship. Confounders such as age may account for part of these differences, which is why publishing the raw data is so important.
Data sharing
The Yellow Card scheme is administered by the MHRA, a government body funded, at least in part, by the public. The data for the scheme is collected largely by NHS staff, who are again funded by the public. However, despite public finance being crucial to the generation of Yellow Card data, the MHRA have refused to release the anonymised individual patient data from this scheme for independent analysis (FOI 21/640). The MHRA argue that release of these data would be too onerous, yet paradoxically these same data are passed on to the vaccine manufacturers for analysis as a matter of routine (FOI 21/942). All that the public can access from Yellow Card is a rudimentary summary of the total numbers of adverse events recorded for each vaccine type in particular medical categories.
The MHRA’s attitude to data sharing stands in stark contrast to the situation in the USA, where the VAERS reporting system [2] provides anonymised individual patient data, and the detailed analyses that this allows has been crucial for recognising important safety signals [3] — albeit US Regulators have been slow off the mark in making full use of the data available to them. We note that the MHRA’s refusal to share the information that they hold within the Yellow Card database would not be tolerated in the general science community where access to raw data is now a prerequisite for publication in peer reviewed journals.
Despite the intransigence of the MHRA over the issue of releasing raw data from the Yellow Card scheme to the general public, it is incumbent upon the scientific community to make the maximum use of the data released from the scheme to scrutinise the validity of the conclusions that the MHRA reach in their weekly reports. This is particularly important to achieve because, despite FOI requests to see the scientific analyses on which their conclusions are based, the MHRA have been unable to produce any such reports (FOI 21/942).
Comparing frequency of reports by vaccine type
The weekly data released from the Yellow Card scheme takes the form of the total number of doses of each of the vaccines given, the total number of reports filed for each vaccine type, and the total number of adverse reactions recorded for each of a huge range of medical conditions compiled separately for each of the vaccine types. What insights can we gain from analysis of this information?
A simple question that we can ask is whether the different vaccines elicit the same or different rates of reporting of adverse reactions or number of reactions per report. The answer is clear (Table 1). There is something about a Moderna injection that generates a higher frequency of adverse event reports with less reactions per report than an Astrazeneca vaccination, which in turn generates a higher frequency of reports and more reactions per report than a Pfizer injection. The figures involved are so huge that these differences cannot be due to chance. There is something important happening that needs to be explained.

Table 1. Percentage of vaccinations resulting in a Yellow card report, and mean number of adverse events per report for three covid-19 vaccines administered in the UK
Risk of misinterpretation
Unfortunately, however, our interpretation can never be secure. The results we see could be due to the vaccines themselves. Alternatively, they could also be due to some confounding factor like the differences in age profile of the patients who were injected with different vaccine types, or to certain vaccine types being injected predominantly as boosters, or some combination of such factors. Yet distinguishing between alternative explanations is vital. If the effects we see are indeed due predominantly to vaccine type, this would have serious implications for vaccination policy and optimum choice of vaccine for minimising adverse reactions. However, analysis of confounding effects can only be achieved if the raw, anonymised individual patient data from the Yellow Card scheme are released by MHRA.
Comparing type of report by vaccine type
The second type of question that we can address using the Yellow Card data is whether choice of vaccines affects the spectrum of medical conditions recorded as adverse reactions. To answer this question, we can first sum up the number of adverse events elicited by each vaccine under the broad headings Blood & Vascular, Cardiac, Immune, Reproductive & Breast, Respiratory, Skin, Nervous System, Eye, Muscle and Other. A simple test for heterogeneity indicates that the relative frequency with which these classes of adverse reactions occur is highly dependent on the type of vaccine administered (χ2(18) = 29508, P<<0.001). Figure 1 illustrates the percentage by which the observed numbers of adverse reactions differ from the number expected if all vaccines elicited the same spectrum of adverse reactions. It is clear from the figure that departures from expectations are particularly large in the categories Blood & Vascular, Cardiac, Reproductive & Breast, and Skin; the different vaccines are eliciting quite different relative frequencies of adverse reaction in these categories.
For the categories Blood & Vascular, Cardiac, and to a lesser extent Immune and Reproductive & Breast, much higher than expected numbers of adverse reactions are elicited when the mRNA vaccines are administered, and lower than expected numbers of adverse reactions are found when the virus vectored Astrazeneca vaccine is used. Given that the same spike protein is encoded in the mRNA and virus vectored vaccines, this suggests that differences in the observed spectra of adverse reactions may be related to the mode of delivery of the spike encoding nucleic acid sequence in the vaccine. This observation for the Cardiac category is in agreement with a recent case series analysis which found that the risk of myocarditis is greater following sequential doses of mRNA vaccine than sequential doses of the adenovirus vaccine [4]. The role of the mRNA vaccine delivery system itself in eliciting adverse reactions must therefore come under scrutiny.

Figure 1. Percentage deviation of observed number of adverse reactions from the number expected if the spectrum of adverse events was the same for all vaccines. Data from nine different categories of adverse events are shown
While this example shows that the Yellow Card data may be helpful for generating ideas and supporting other studies, the inadequacy of the partial information currently released by the MHRA means that our interpretation of such data will always be compromised. Again, we do not possess the means to control for possible confounding factors (age and sex of individual, vaccine dose number etc.) that could contribute to the results observed. Nevertheless, in this example, the sheer size of the apparent effects of vaccine type on the spectrum of adverse effects indicates that a thorough investigation is essential. If the vaccine effect were confirmed, this would have serious real-world implications for the Covid-19 vaccination programme and the safety and health of the UK population.
Conclusion
The data we need to carry out the necessary analysis to maximise the usefulness of the Yellow Card scheme has already been collected at the public expense and is currently held by the MHRA. We call upon the MHRA immediately to release the raw, anonymised, individual patient data from the Yellow Card reporting scheme to enable rigorous scrutiny of Covid-19 vaccine adverse events by doctors, researchers and the public. This echoes the recent call by BMJ editors for immediate release of raw data from trials conducted by vaccine manufacturers [5].
2. https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/ensuringsafety/monitoring/vaers/index.html
3. https://jessicar.substack.com/p/a-report-on-myocarditis-adverse-events
4. https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.23.21268276v1
5. Doshi P, Godlee F, Abbasi K. Covid-19 vaccines and treatments: we must have raw data, now BMJ 2022; 376 Covid-19 vaccines and treatments: we must have raw data, now | The BMJ
How Many Pregnant Women Have Actually Died of COVID-19?
The Daily Sceptic | February 3, 2022
There follows a guest post by a Daily Sceptic reader, who wishes to remain anonymous, who, being pregnant, was following closely the advice and studies concerning pregnant women. However, her own analysis of the reports on the deaths of pregnant women with COVID-19 suggested that the alarming statistics about Covid in pregnancy she was being provided with did not stack up.
As a pregnant woman, I have been following advice and studies that concern this group closely. Unfortunately, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find any balanced information amongst the blatant propaganda. I am so sick of being told at every turn that ICU is full of unvaccinated pregnant women. Below is an example of the stuff that gets shared online by my local maternity team.

So I thought I would look at what stats MBRRACE had released lately. They have two reports that caught my eye in particular: one on maternal Covid deaths March-May 2020 (10 women) and another covering the period June 2020-March 2021 (17 women).
Despite being such a small group of people, I feel that each case is a fascinating story that paints a dramatically different picture to that portrayed by the media and the NHS. Here are some points that stood out to me from each report
March-May 2020 (10 deaths)
- None of the women who died received any actual treatment, just support.
- Three of the ten women died because they were too scared to go to hospital.
- Four women died of suicide and not being able to access help was a factor (I don’t think they were included in the ten deaths, but the insinuation is that Covid restrictions contributed to their deaths).
- Two women were murdered by their partners, with health services already knowing they were at risk (again, I don’t think they were included in the ten, but the insinuation about restrictions is there again).
- The quote “pregnancy [sic] and postpartum women do not appear to be at higher risk of severe COVID-19 than non-pregnant women” seems telling.
- Only two women were classified as having received “good care”.
June 2020-March 2021 (17 deaths)
- Three women did not even have Covid but died as a result of the side effects of restrictions.
- Four women tested positive but died of unrelated causes – two of these women received poor care because of their Covid status.
- 60% of the women who actually died from Covid were obese and a further 20% were overweight.
- 50% had pre-existing mental health conditions (personally I believe that this both prevents women from being able to speak up for themselves and creates a stigma that they are ‘difficult patients’).
- One woman died at home of a urinary tract infection because no translator was available for her telephone appointment.
- Four women died because they were too scared to go to hospital – one of these women sought no antenatal care at all and died after giving birth at home.
- One woman died after being given painkillers for backache – she was only seen remotely by a GP so he or she couldn’t see she was both heavily pregnant and had sepsis.
- Another woman died of sepsis from a miscarriage because doctors assumed she just had (asymptomatic) Covid.
- A woman died of obvious kidney/liver problems shortly after birth because again, doctors bizarrely assumed she was actually suffering from Covid following a positive routine test.
- 90% of the women who died had “care” that was not managed by the RCOG guidelines.
- One woman was not given treatment despite poor clinical indications, as she did not “look sick”.
- Three women who were very poorly and were considered for ECMO were denied this despite not having any contraindications.
- One woman died from a pulmonary embolism at home after her GP’s online triage system did not recognise either her Covid status or recent pregnancy as risk factors and didn’t give her an urgent appointment.
- Only 10% of the women received “good care”, and in 70% improvements in care may have meant they survived.
The reports are heartbreaking and I do not wish to diminish the pain that these women’s families must be suffering, but it is abundantly clear that very few of these women died from actual Covid – many appear to be victims of the restrictions and fear – and the handful that did had significant confounding factors.
DATA REVEALS HIGHER COVID RATE IN THE VACCINATED
The Highwire with Del Bigtree | January 29, 2022
Scotland’s public health data has gone viral, revealing that the vaccinated are the primary drivers of the pandemic. Is this why Scotland is shifting on Covid restrictions?
Do NHS Exemptions from the Covid vaccines really exist?
Experience of retired NHS employee with severe allergies suggests not
Health Advisory and Recovery Team | February 1, 2022
Recently published in the Conservative Woman was an extraordinary account by a woman with a history of severe allergies who nevertheless was refused an NHS vaccine exemption.
Having several years ago suffered life-threatening anaphylaxis to an antibiotic containing polyethylene glycol (a component of the Pfizer jab) and also prolonged vomiting after Hepatitis A vaccine (which contains polysorbate found in AstraZeneca), she now carries an adrenaline EpiPen. In January 2021, her GP agreed she should certainly not have any of the vaccines on offer.
But roll on a year and her efforts to get a vaccination exemption for travel met with a very different response. Far from signing the appropriate exemption form, her GP insisted on referring her to an immunologist who was eager to arrange for her to vaccinated under medical supervision in the local hospital. And when she not unreasonably declined the offer, her GP has told her she is not eligible for an exemption.
The MHRA information specifies ‘COVID-19 mRNA Vaccine BNT162b2 should not be given if you are allergic to the active substance or any of the other ingredients of this medicine, listed in section 6.’
Similar advice is contained regarding AstraZeneca which states, ‘Do not have the vaccine if you are allergic to any of the active substances’
Moreover the government guidance on medical reasons for vaccination exemption includes, ‘a person with severe allergies to all currently available vaccines’
But despite listing such allergies as a contraindication, the vaccine information leaflet states under warnings and precautions, ‘Tell your doctor, pharmacist or nurse before vaccination:
If you have ever had a severe allergic reaction after any other vaccine injection or after you were given COVID-19 Vaccine AstraZeneca in the past. In other words, a past history of allergy is a contraindication to the first dose, but an allergic reaction to the first dose is only a reason to speak to your doctor but not a contraindication to a second dose?
This brings us full circle to informed consent and a timely reminder that all risks must be fully discussed as relevant to the individual and balanced against the risks of not proceeding and explaining any alternative treatments. For this lady, would the risk of catching and becoming seriously ill with omicron genuinely outweigh her risks for anaphylaxis? Would checking her vitamin D levels and providing supplements if needed, be a safer alternative?
Moreover, how is the NHS able to provide such a service, despite apparently under pressure of being overwhelmed, plus the reported huge backlog.
Above all, it begs the question, whatever happened to ‘First, do no harm’?
We need an inquiry into nudge
Letter to PACAC about ethical concerns arising from the Government’s use of covert psychological ‘nudges’
By Laura Dodsworth | February 1, 2022
Mr William Wragg, MP, Chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee
1st February 2022
Dear Mr Wragg,
Re: Ethical concerns arising from the Government’s use of covert psychological ‘nudges’.
Thank you for meeting me to allow me to explain my concerns about the government’s use of behavioural science during the Covid-19 pandemic and beyond. I noted your positive comments about the need to better understand how nudge sits within parliamentary democracy and ministerial accountability, in a Telegraph article dated 28th January 2022, entitled ‘Government nudge unit “used grossly unethical tactics to scare public into Covid compliance”’, which was written in response to a letter by psychologist Gary Sidley et al requesting an investigation.1 I concur with Gary’s letter wholeheartedly.
During the course of researching my book A State of Fear: how the UK government weaponised fear during the Covid-19 pandemic I gained a fascinating but sometimes disturbing insight into how reliant the government is on behavioural science and how little transparency there is about the people, methods, impacts and ethics.2
Behavioural scientists and politicians have called for public consultation in the past, but it has not happened. The Science and Technology Select Committee’s 2011 report Behaviour Change noted that there are ‘ethical issues because they involve altering behaviour through mechanisms of which people are not obviously aware’ and ‘ethical acceptability depends to a large extent on an intervention’s proportionality’.3 David Halpern, the head of the Behavioural Insights Team (BIT), has said that ‘if national or local governments are to use these approaches [behavioural psychology tools], they need to ensure that they have public permission to do so – ie, that the nudge is transparent, and that there has been appropriate debate about it’.4
The MINDSPACE: Influencing behaviour through public policy discussion document which David Halpern co-authored recommended a public consultation about the use of behavioural insights.5 This has never been more pertinent. Fear messaging was used to encourage compliance with the rules. This has changed our lives and our relationships with each other. It has also changed our relationship with the government. This was predicted in the same report, which warned:
‘People have a strong instinct for reciprocity that informs their relationship with government – they pay taxes and the government provides services in return. This transactional model remains intact if government legislates and provides advice to inform behaviour. But if government is seen as using powerful, pre-conscious effects to subtly change behaviour, people may feel the relationship has changed: now the state is affecting “them” – their very personality.’
Our personalities were changed 2020-2021. And the use of fear – a particularly destabilising tactic – has made recovery harder. The collateral damage is becoming clearer, not least with the identification of Covid Anxiety Syndrome, whereby people have heightened fears which are disproportionate to the remaining threat.6 While it is difficult to extricate the different causes – lockdown, the epidemic itself, government messaging, the media – the overall result merits close scrutiny.
One of the BIT founders, Simon Ruda, admitted in an article published in Unherd, that ‘the most egregious and far-reaching mistake made in responding to the pandemic has been the level of fear willingly conveyed on the public’.7 It’s a pity that this revelation was made so late in the pandemic management. (After the sale of BIT to NESTA for a ‘healthy capital gain’, as Ruda observes, for the BIT shareholders.) If the previous calls for public consultation on the use of nudge had happened years ago, then maybe this egregious mistake could have been avoided. But it is never too late.
I believe the UK needs a full analysis of the tactics used and their impacts from experts, including psychologists, behavioural scientists, mental health specialists, politicians, political scientists, sociologists, philosophers, civil liberties organisations, lawyers, as well as representatives of the public.
Furthermore, the harmful impacts of behavioural science go beyond the handling of the Covid epidemic. The impact of behavioural insights on mental health was reported in Loan Charge All-Party Parliamentary Group Report on the Morse Review into the Loan Charge March 2020.8 It concluded that independent assessment and a suspension of HMRC’s use of behavioural insights was needed, ‘in light of the ongoing suicide risk to those impacted by the Loan Charge’. Clear misconduct and bullying, including using 30 behavioural insights in communications, were cited in one of the seven known suicides of people facing the Loan Charge.
The collaboration between a major UK broadcaster and BIT to promote one of the most controversial policies today is deeply alarming. The report, The Power of TV: Nudging Viewers to Decarbonise their Lifestyles, jointly published by BIT and Sky, shows little regard for the obligation imposed on broadcasters by Ofcom’s Broadcasting Code to maintain ‘due impartiality’ across all their output, particularly when it comes to news and current affairs.9 It also neglects the requirement that broadcasters expose viewers to a wide range of different views when it comes to ‘matters of major political and industrial controversy and major matters relating to current public policy’. I wrote a letter of complaint to Ofcom with Toby Young, Founder of the Free Speech Union, on 21st December 2021.
Recently, the Home Office has hired an advertising agency to mobilise public opinion against encrypted communications, with plans that include some shockingly manipulative tactics to sway concerned parents.10
In the past two years I have noted new behavioural science appointments within the government, Public Health England (now UKHSA) and NHS, and nudge seems likely to play a bigger part in future government attempts to transform us into ‘model citizens’ and foreground acceptance of controversial policies. Indeed, this is openly acknowledged. One recent report from a team at the University of Bath already shows how behavioural psychologists hope to segue from Covid to climate behaviour change while ‘habits are weakest and most malleable to change’.11 A BIT paper on how to nudge the public towards Net Zero referred to our ‘powerful tendency to conform’.12
I agree with Gary Sidley that the government must be held to account over its use of behavioural science. The Covid epidemic has shone a spotlight onto how embedded behavioural science is within government, but the inquiry would benefit from widening the scope to a historical review and also agree new frameworks for the future. This should include a historical analysis of all campaigns (especially the many unpublished ones), a review of the ethical framework government behavioural scientists adhere to, and scrutiny of accountability. Most importantly, a review must include the general public, who are as yet unaware of the prolific campaigns to influence them below the level of consciousness, but nevertheless fund the campaigns through taxation.
Nudge assumes we are not rational beings. Ruda does not shy away from this in his article, clearly stating that ‘behavioural science was conceived as a means of recognising and correcting the biases that lead humans to make non-rational decisions’. Stripping away our rational choices and influencing us at a subliminal level is anti-democratic and we are now at a crucial point to take stock of the government’s use of these tactics. I hope that PACAC can conduct a comprehensive and independent investigation. I would be delighted to assist by sharing notes and evidence.
I look forward to speaking with you.
Yours sincerely,
Laura Dodsworth
Justice For the Hyde Park One

By Andrew Rootsey | The Daily Sceptic | February 1, 2022
As you may recall, we secured Debbie’s acquittal at Cheltenham Magistrates Court on the December 20th 2021 for offences relating to organising/being involved in organising a gathering of more than 30 people during a period of national lockdown or alternatively for participating in the gathering.
The relevant gathering was a protest held in Stratford Park in Stroud in November 2020 against the restrictions imposed on the British public under the Coronavirus Regulations. The protest was called the ‘Freedom Rally’ and was attended by more than 50 people.
The Stroud ‘Freedom Rally’ was held two days into the second national lockdown and therefore at the time it was illegal to organise a gathering of more than 30 people or to meet in groups of more than two people. A conviction would have left her liable for a £10,000 fine.
Ms. Hicks was acquitted of both offences after the court accepted our argument that her arrest and prosecution was a disproportionate interference with her human rights – namely the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, given that she was engaging in a legitimate protest.
The court found that Ms. Hicks had organised the ‘Freedom Rally’ and had breached the Coronavirus Regulations in force at the time by doing so. However, she had a reasonable excuse because she was attending a legitimate, peaceful and well-organised protest. The officers on the ground at the protest had been labouring under a misapprehension of the law – that protesting was not lawful under the Regulations – and were essentially imposing a blanket ban on protesting. Therefore, their actions in arresting her were not rational or proportionate.
In complete contrast – and a perfect example of how this contentious piece of legislation is flawed and open to misinterpretation – on the November 16th 2021 the City of London Magistrates Court convicted Debbie of breaching similar coronavirus regulations by protesting in Hyde Park against the imposition of lockdown restrictions during the pandemic. The District Judge in this case found that Debbie did not have a ‘reasonable excuse’ for protesting and found that the interference with her Human Rights was proportionate. Debbie was convicted and sentenced to a financial penalty.
The case raises important issues on freedom of expression and assembly, as well as the chilling of the right to protest. We wish to appeal this case to the High Court in order for the High Court to settle the important questions of law raised.
A fundamental consideration for the High Court is the ambiguity of the right to protest during the Coronavirus pandemic during periods of national lockdown and the operation of the ‘reasonable excuse’ jurisdiction in this regard.
The Government has made it clear, as have the courts, including in Debbie’s case before the Cheltenham Magistrates Court, that protesting during the Coronavirus pandemic was never illegal. Yet that was not always clear from the Coronavirus regulations nor was it the understanding of most police officers. How the reasonable excuse defence is to operate in these circumstances requires clarity and we are confident that the High Court will settle the issue in our favour and set a precedent for future cases and those seeking to appeal against their own convictions.
Debbie Hicks is probably best known for filming within the Gloucester Royal Hospital in December 2020 during Tier 3 restrictions. Debbie did so, exercising her freedom of expression, in order to highlight that Government restrictions were having a devastating effect upon access to healthcare across the board and to investigate mainstream media reports that hospitals were overflowing with patients.
Despite her efforts to avoid confrontation, she was challenged at the hospital by two employees. During the exchange, which lasted less than a minute, Debbie did not film the staff members. She explained the purpose of her visit and her views as to the provision of NHS services during lockdown. Staff members took offence at her comments and subsequently made a complaint to the police. Debbie immediately left the hospital voluntarily and was subsequently arrested at her home in front of her family and charged with using abusive, threatening or disorderly words or behaviour.
Debbie was not at the hospital deliberately seeking an encounter with staff. She has in the past been a vociferous supporter of the NHS and has supported NHS staff in respect of vaccine mandates.
In connection with this episode, Debbie stood trial for an offence under Section 5 of Public Order Act on January 6th 2022 and having adjourned the case in order to hand down his judgement the District Judge convicted Debbie of a S5 Public Order Act offence on January 19th 2022 at Cirencester Magistrates Court.
We wish to appeal this conviction as well and ask that the High Court settle this case on the basis that the District Judge was wrong in law to convict Debbie of this offence. We are firmly of the view that the Prosecution case simply did not cross the threshold of what constitutes abusive, threatening or disorderly words or behaviour. The District Judge’s analysis was flawed and did not properly interpret Supreme Court authorities nor give appropriate weight to Debbie’s rights of freedom of expression and assembly as enshrined in the European Convention for Human Rights, nor give appropriate weight to the political nature of Debbie’s views when the case law makes clear political freedom of expression should be given special protection.
Debbie is trying to raise £10,000 to take both cases to the High Court. She hopes that those who continue to believe in freedom of speech and the the right to protest will continue to support her. Our hope is that if we can get these convictions overturned, it will set a legal precedent for those convicted of similar offences and who may face prosecution in the future.
Debbie needs to raise funds in order to pay her legal costs and any help is hugely appreciated. Her fundraiser can be found here.
Andrew Rootsey is a solicitor at Murray Hughman.


